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Puppy With No Front Legs Loves To Snuggle With His Foster Dad

When Nubby was just four hours old, a veterinarian suggested he be euthanized.

The puppy had been born without his front legs. And while his mother didn't reject him, Nubby didn't have the strength to get past the other puppies to eat.

"His siblings were pushing him out of the way. He would have perished," Lou Robinson, Nubby's foster mom, tells The Dodo. "He came home with me."

Robinson is a longtime animal rescuer based outside Houston, Texas, and founder of a group called Warriors Educate About Rescue - through which Robinson teaches classes about how to compassionately care for animals, and puts out a calendar featuring Texas firefighters with rescue pets.

Nubby, in other words, is in good hands.

And, frequently, on a good shoulder - that shoulder belonging to Robinson's husband, Mark.

Nubby is back home now, with Robinson and her husband. He just turned 5 weeks old.

Until he is a little bigger, the doctors can't probe him enough to find out the extent of his esophageal abnormalities. They don't know if they are permanent and severe, if they can be treated, or if he'll just grow out of the worst of it.

Robinson spends a lot of time watching Nubby. She likes the silly faces he makes while he sleeps. Then he wakes up and wants to play, play, play.

She likes to think about keeping Nubby. Having him grow up to be part of Warriors Educate About Rescue. He could go to schools, and teach about animal welfare. Help kids learn that it's OK to be different.

That's what Robinson's hoping for. It will depend on a lot of good luck.

Nubby doesn't seem to realize that he's any different.

He is smart. He is active. He is learning to do an army crawl, and is trying to get up onto his back legs by pushing off from his face. He seems frustrated - "pissed off," is how Robinson puts it - not to have mastered this move, quite yet.